The U.N.-Arab League special envoy to Syria, Kofi Annan, has announced his resignation after failing to bring an end to more than a year of violence. Both sides of the conflict have faced new accusations of committing atrocities this week amidst escalating clashes. We discuss the situation in Syria and the likely impact of Annan’s resignation with Charles Glass, former ABC News chief Middle East correspondent and author of the soon to be reissued book on Syria, "Tribes With Flags." Glass spent 10 days in Syria this summer. "Kofi Annan’s resignation is a serious setback for anyone who had hoped that there could be a diplomatic resolution of this conflict," Glass says. "This is clearly an indication that diplomacy is failing, and ... warfare seems to be the only way out." [includes rush transcript]

If Julian Assange is granted asylum in Ecuador, he will become a resident of Latin America, where the trove of classified U.S. State Department cables he strategically disseminated through WikiLeaks has generated hundreds of headlines, from Mexico to Chile. A year after thousands of cables on Latin America were first released, the revelations have had different results — in two countries it led to the forced departure of the U.S. ambassador; in another it helped change the course of a presidential election. We’re joined by Peter Kornbluh, guest editor of "WikiLeaks: Latin America," a recent edition of The Nation magazine devoted to exploring the impact of WikiLeaks across the region. Kornbluh is a senior analyst on Latin America at the National Security Archive. [includes rush transcript]

Gore Vidal died on Tuesday at the age of 86 from complications of pneumonia. Vidal was a national icon who authored some 25 novels, several plays, two memoirs and multiple volumes of essays. He was one of the best-known and most prolific chroniclers of American history and politics, dedicating his work to critiquing the injustices of U.S. society. We air an excerpt of a Democracy Now! interview with Vidal from 2003 in the early stages of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. [includes rush transcript]

DN! In Depth

By Amy Goodman with Denis Moynihan — The corporate television newscasts spend more and more time covering the increasingly disruptive, costly and at times deadly weather. But they consistently fail to make the link between extreme weather and climate change.